There are a lot of timelines of the Ukraine scandal out there but they are mostly quite hard to follow. This one put together by the Democrats is simple. If Republicans cared at all about anything but their own careers and their Dear Leader, they would be persuaded by that alone:
| Early 2019 | Trump and his allies willingly embrace Yuriy Lutsenko, who replaced Viktor Shokin as Ukraine’s top prosecutor, despite widespread agreement that Lutsenko was deeply corrupt. |
| Early 2019 | Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani partners with Lutsenko to dig up dirt on Trump’s political opponent and smear a U.S. ambassador who got in their way. |
| March 26-29 | Giuliani and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speak on the phone. Pompeo requests more information on Giuliani’s claims about the Bidens and Yovanovitch, which Giuliani provides in a nine-page document. Pompeo and Giuliani speak on the phone again the next day. |
| Late March/ Early April | Conservative writer John Solomon publishes several articles — facilitated by Giuliani — attacking Yovanovitch and Biden. Trump promotes the allegations in a tweet; they’re also amplified by Donald Trump Jr. and other Trump allies. |
| April 21 | Zelensky was elected President of Ukraine in a surprise victory. This suddenly meant Lutsenko’s job was in danger. Trump and Giuliani shifted their focus to directly pressuring Zelensky. |
| May 1 | News breaks about Giuliani’s efforts — on which he’s kept Trump in the loop — to push the Ukrainian government to open an investigation intended to help Trump win in 2020. |
| May 6 | U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, who is widely respected in the national security community for her efforts to address corruption, is publicly forced out. The State Department had previously asked Yovanovitch to extend her tour until 2020. |
| May 9 | Rudy Giuliani announces plans to travel to Kiev to push the Ukrainian government to open investigations that “will be very, very, helpful to my client” — Donald Trump. Giuliani admits that some could say the trip is “improper,” but says it’s not illegal because “we’re not meddling in an election, we’re meddling in an investigation, which we have a right to do.” |
| May 10 | Rudy Giuliani writes to Zelensky to request a meeting. He does so in his capacity as Trump’s personal lawyer and with Trump’s “knowledge and consent.” Giuliani cancels his planned Kiev trip after an outcry. |
| Mid-May | More than two months before his July 25 phone call with Trump, Zelensky becomes concerned with how he would navigate pressure from Trump and Giuliani to investigate his political rival. |
| Mid-July | Trump tells acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney to withhold almost $400 million in military aid to Ukraine. OMB officials pass the message on to the State Department and the Pentagon, saying that Trump has “concerns” and that the administration was looking at whether the spending was necessary. Administration officials are told to tell Congress that the delays are part of an “interagency process,” giving them no other information. State Department and Pentagon officials are “puzzled and alarmed” to learn of the hold on Ukrainian aid. |
| July 25 | Trump speaks on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He repeatedly pressures Zelensky to work with Rudy Giuliani and, notably, Attorney General William Barr on an investigation that could be damaging to his political opponent. |
| July/August | Pentagon officials argue to the White House that the aid to Ukraine is effective, but are ignored. Pentagon officials become suspicious when other aid is released, but Ukraine aid is still held up. Staff from the State Department and Pentagon are stonewalled by OMB and contact offices of members of Congress. The Trump administration tells members of Congress variously that the administration was reviewing the Ukraine aid to make sure it was in the best interest of foreign policy or that there was a review on corruption in Ukraine. |
| Late July | The Pentagon warns the White House that if the aid wasn’t released in time, the Pentagon would likely be breaking the law — a warning the White House ignores. |
| August 12 | An anonymous member of the intelligence community files a whistleblower complaint about Trump. Mick Mulvaney tries to schedule a call with Trump and top officials involved in the freeze, including Vought, Bolton, and Cipollone, but has trouble doing so because Trump has a scheduled golf game with professional golfer John Daly. |
| August 16 | Bolton, with a memo saying the NSC, Pentagon, and State Department all want the aid released, personally asks Trump to release the aid. Trump refuses. |
| Mid-August | DOD raises concerns it may not be able to fully obligate DOD funds before the end of the fiscal year. |
| August 21 | News breaks that Rudy Giuliani has been in communication with a top aide to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. |
| August 26 | Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson determines that the whistleblower complaint was an “urgent concern” and that it is credible. He sends the complaint to ODNI. |
| August 28 | The aid freeze becomes public in a Politico article. |
| Late August | Bolton, Esper, and Pompeo meet with Trump in the Oval Office in an attempt to convince him that he should release the Ukraine aid. Trump replies that Ukraine is corrupt and refuses to release the money. Trump administration officials tell lawmakers that the aid to Ukraine is being held up because they are trying to gauge its effectiveness. |
| September 2 | Statutory deadline for Acting DNI Joseph Maguire to forward the whistleblower complaint to Congress. He does not. |
| September 3 | A bipartisan group of senators write a letter to acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney expressing “deep concern” about the administration’s withholding of the Ukraine military aid funds. |
| Early September | Sen. Rob Portman talks to Trump about the aid to Ukraine. Sen. Lindsey Graham tells the White House he plans to support a Durbin amendment to a defense spending bill that would block Pentagon spending to get the Ukraine funds released. |
| September 9 | ICIG Atkinson writes to Reps. Adam Schiff and Devin Nunes disclosing the existence of a whistleblower complaint. The House Foreign Affairs, Intelligence, and Oversight committees open an investigation into whether Trump and Rudy Giuliani have been inappropriately using the American foreign policy process to pressure the Ukrainian government to help Trump’s reelection campaign. The House committees request documents including the transcript of and information about Trump’s July 25 call with the Ukrainian president, any records relating to Giuliani and suspension of aid to Ukraine, and correspondence related to the Biden and Manafort matters. |
| September 10 | Adam Schiff writes to Acting DNI Joseph Maguire demanding that he forward the whistleblower complaint as required by law. |
| September 11 | Trump meets with Pence, Mulvaney, and Rob Portman to discuss the aid freeze. The White House releases the military assistance to Ukraine that it had been holding up. A senior Trump administration official won’t comment on the reason for the delay. |
I usually eschew making this particular argument but I can’t resist. Imagine what the Republicans would say if you replaced the name Trump with Obama or Clinton. It boggles the mind.
And honestly, I don’t think the Democrats would defend them in lockstep. We know this because they all rushed to condemn Bill Clinton for his much less significant lying about his inappropriate personal behavior and would have happily censured him for it. If he’d done something like this at least half of them, if not many more, would have voted to remove.
Republicans count on the Democrats to be afraid of being seen as partisan hacks by their constituents (even if they are in many situations.) Republican shamelessness allows them much more room for rank partisanship.